Interesting Read

Yea I read that yesterday. Interesting.

Basically he doesn't believe the data from the last study that says number of hunters is declining.
It is a complex issue for sure. Loss of habitat has to be a huge issue. It could be argued that hunting numbers have to decrease because we have less places to do it. I think around here it has become a lot busier in the woods, but not because we have so many new hunters. We are just all being pushed onto the same tracts of land.

Now what is going on out west? Wouldn't even know where to start. I'm guessing the non resident hunting has grown, but that is easily controlled if they want to.
 
It is a complex issue for sure. Loss of habitat has to be a huge issue. It could be argued that hunting numbers have to decrease because we have less places to do it. I think around here it has become a lot busier in the woods, but not because we have so many new hunters. We are just all being pushed onto the same tracts of land.

Now what is going on out west? Wouldn't even know where to start. I'm guessing the non resident hunting has grown, but that is easily controlled if they want to.
I do believe the amount of hunters is declining. Iam starting to see that in pheasant hunting. Mid week there are birds where 5 years ago it was no birds and all hunters.

I also believe hunters that are serious are concentrating in the best areas making it seem like the amount of hunters is increasing.
This. Less land to hunt in PRODUCTIVE areas. Quality hunting on private land is getting more expensive and less easy for the average joe to attain and justify the expenses for.

This leaves public land getting more popular for everyone as people lose their spots to leasing, development, anti hunters, and posting.

Central/ Western Ma has plenty of land and in bow season I never see anyone. Not a lot of deer
Fxck, nobody wants to hunt out here it sucks. I can spend an opening day of shotgun walking the vast woods behind my house and ill see no orange, no brown either.

So serious hunters, even with the tons of land to hunt out my way, go east to burbs, or south to Ct, or west to NY where its easier because the herd is better. But good land to hunt is hard to find there.

So what’s happening is people know there are more deer in the burbs. So there is more competition from serious hunters out there for the small parcels.
This makes it seem like there are more hunters, when in fact hunters are just using statistics to find the best areas and end up all in the same spots


Other than that the cost for hunts out west and deer tags in the midwest is dumb. The competition and cost of good lease land is retarded.

Really....selling your significant other that money isnt better off spent in the grocery store is more of a chore now when it comes to those high dollar western tags.

Those that do hunt public land find that you have to put a decent amount of time in for the most part to be successful. Not every hunter can do that and they get very disappointed very quickly and either quit or double down a nd work to find quality land/hunting where they can harvest something without taking 2 weeks time off.

Older hunters are aging out, lost their good spots and wont hunt shitty public land. They will either stop hunting altogether or if they can afford it will pay and go to better places
 
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I do believe the amount of hunters is declining. Iam starting to see that in pheasant hunting. Mid week there are birds where 5 years ago it was no birds and all hunters.

I also believe hunters that are serious are concentrating in the best areas making it seem like the amount of hunters is increasing.
This. Less land to hunt in PRODUCTIVE areas. Quality hunting on private land is getting more expensive and less easy for the average joe to attain and justify the expenses for.

This leaves public land getting more popular for everyone as people lose their spots to leasing, development, anti hunters, and posting.

Central/ Western Ma has plenty of land and in bow season I never see anyone. Not a lot of deer
Fxck, nobody wants to hunt out here it sucks. I can spend an opening day of shotgun walking the vast woods behind my house and ill see no orange, no brown either.

So serious hunters, even with the tons of land to hunt out my way, go east to burbs, or south to Ct, or west to NY where its easier because the herd is better. But good land to hunt is hard to find there.

So what’s happening is people know there are more deer in the burbs. So there is more competition from serious hunters out there for the small parcels.
This makes it seem like there are more hunters, when in fact hunters are just using statistics to find the best areas and end up all in the same spots


Other than that the cost for hunts out west and deer tags in the midwest is dumb. The competition and cost of good lease land is retarded.

Really....selling your significant other that money isnt better off spent in the grocery store is more of a chore now when it comes to those high dollar western tags.

Those that do hunt public land find that you have to put a decent amount of time in for the most part to be successful. Not every hunter can do that and they get very disappointed very quickly and either quit or double down a nd work to find quality land/hunting where they can harvest something without taking 2 weeks time off.

Older hunters are aging out, lost their good spots and wont hunt shitty public land. They will either stop hunting altogether or if they can afford it will pay and go to better places

Wait until next year when they split off the Pheasant Fee like most states do. Suddenly, you'll find even MORE pheasant. At least for a time. Then the # of pheasant around will decline again as they can only buy so many birds with the lic fees.


As far as this - I think it's not bright to not encourage people to hunt and fish. Will all of them become annual whitetail stalkers?? No. Will all of them respect hunting and be on the side of supporting it? YES THEY FREAKING WILL! And that alone is worth it.

Oh, and they might carry that fishing or hunting or combo lic. for a number of years without using it - funding more local conservation projects.

Yeah. We don't want them in our deer fields so stop bringing them in. Sure. Great idea. LOL
 
Wait until next year when they split off the Pheasant Fee like most states do. Suddenly, you'll find even MORE pheasant. At least for a time. Then the # of pheasant around will decline again as they can only buy so many birds with the lic fees.


As far as this - I think it's not bright to not encourage people to hunt and fish. Will all of them become annual whitetail stalkers?? No. Will all of them respect hunting and be on the side of supporting it? YES THEY FREAKING WILL! And that alone is worth it.

Oh, and they might carry that fishing or hunting or combo lic. for a number of years without using it - funding more local conservation projects.

Yeah. We don't want them in our deer fields so stop bringing them in. Sure. Great idea. LOL

Lately the one thing I cannot complain about here is the pheasant hunting. They don't stock as much as they say, but they never did anyway. Im used to that.

But the difference I see is the old timers are aging out and leaving the fields empty in the middle of the week, where there were once combed over by newly retired baby boomers. Some of them have left pheasant hunting for bowhunting, etc as well.......

This year I shot my season limit in a very short time, without even really trying much. Took a couple half days off mid week. I have a good dog, but I ran into many times when the fields were unhunted and loaded with birds, I'd shoot two and leave, hoping the dog wouldn't go on point on the way back to the car.

Only 1 time did I see a guy without a dog, so I asked him to hunt with me so we could shoot more than 2 birds over my dog and hunt for longer than an hour.

I can consider that I might have hit it lucky, but nearly every time out I ran into birds, and this is the 2nd year this has happened, where in years past, they were hunted out right away.
 
I think it's great. But it's been funded by general-fund contributions. It's hunting welfare. Splitting the fee makes so much more sense and it's how many (most?? All but mASS????) do it.
 
Not so sure about that.

What many don't know, is in central MA, my club and a few others pay $2500 each year towards raising the birds on the prison grounds, we release on our club grounds and other grounds that are open to the public.

We are actually considering getting out of the program and having paid for hunts instead because the quality would be better and we could close it off and get what we pay for.

Our neighboring club has done this, and I've joined so I can hunt on Sundays, and shoot way more than a limit of 6 state birds.

This stamp thing may seal the deal........and we may switch to a game preserve and shut off our grounds to the public for pheasant hunting.
 
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